Our U.S. Pat. No. 6,991,527 B2 discloses the construction of a rubbing tool that in one aspect resembles a deodorant stick, with a tubular housing containing a body of compressed lofty nonwoven mildly abrasive fibre, the fibre arranged either as a series of stacked pads or a roll of fibrous web, either optionally impregnated with chemical formulations. The pads were detachably attached to the stack and arranged normal to the axis of a tubular body so as to form layers, the end layer projecting from an orifice at one end, the first end, for rubbing against a surface. After rubbing the used pad is peeled off to expose a new surface, which is then positioned in the orifice ready for rubbing by indexing the stack along the tube, the indexing force applied to a slide-able platform located towards the second end of the stack. The platform slides inside the tube, conveniently done by coupling the platform with a propel/repel screw with its operating knob at the second end of the tool.
Originally the tool was designed for applying industrial chemicals to surfaces while rubbing, for example applying primers or friction modifying fluids onto metals. Other uses were found in cleaning, in particular removing stains from wood and soft furnishings. Further uses emerged in cleaning and treating ovenware. While the design has proved satisfactory for these uses, the underlying principle of storing and disposing of used layered pads has now been extended to improve these tools for domestic and car body cleaning and for use in other new areas, in particular the application of cosmetic lotions for skin care and shaving lubricants.
The improvement to the tool being the provision of means for transferring each pad, separately onto a functionally shaped pad carrying area on the outside of the tool case before rubbing, The pad carrying area is positioned on the removable closure and pads with new rubbing faces (friction faces) are transferred from inside the tubular body onto the outside of the closure without touching by hand, thus avoiding any risk of contamination of the pad or the users hands. Furthermore by selecting a suitably resilient pad material, its stiffness is usefully influenced over the rubbing face by shaping the pad carrying area so that it provides greater support (stiffness) in its central region, the support reducing progressively towards its edge, thereby providing a rubbing face with a soft edge, which soft edge minimises induced stresses associated with sliding the tool edge over a soft substrate such as soft furnishing, fabric, leather, skin or plant tissues. The soft edged rubbing pads reduce risk of injury during cosmetic procedures.
Finally, the step of removing the pad to be used for rubbing from the stack of unused pads and then resealing the storage cavity eliminates the risk of contamination of the new unused pads stored within the body during rubbing.